Charter versus traditional public schools: a panel study of the technical efficiency in Ohio

This paper builds upon prior research attempting to answer the question ‘Does money matter?’ in public education by offering some insight into the potential advantages of charter schools over their district counterparts. In order to develop an accurate model of the true relationship between resources and performance, Adkins and Moomaw [(2003). “The Impact of Local Funding on the Technical Efficiency of Oklahoma School.” Economics Letters 81(1): 31–37] suggest the use of a technical inefficiency model. Along these lines, we employ panel data of Ohio public schools to measure the potential technical efficiency gains of charter schools over traditional public schools using a stochastic frontier production model.